Kevin Beal

Haha. That's a good point about the horror. And it has led me to a certain level of success. Not that I'm super successful or anything, but at least I'm working in an industry that I am passionate about and have learned a ton of skills I never thought I would prior, have great prospects, etc. Maybe I should give myself more credit. Thanks!

Prairie voles are often held up as the most pair bonded animals on earth. They're rodents and they stick with their partners essentially all the time. These chemicals are meant to create pair bonding behavior in animals, including humans. Casual sex is working against our biology. That's not to say that it's impossible, just so unlikely as to cast doubt on every friends with benefits relationship out there. (I've never heard of it working out well for anyone). This whole debate reminds me of this video:

Possibly the two biggest motivators in my life have been envy and horror. Many of the things which I'm good at, are skills that other people had who I was determined to get better at, like guitar, singing and debating. (Spite was a big motivator in the singing too, because people told me I sang like crap my whole life). Hitting rock bottom woke me up to the fact that I needed to turn my life around. The horror of that experience keeps me honest with myself, and I discourage my own rationalizations, holding myself to a very high standard. That's why I got into therapy and consumed so much FDR content, pushed past my comfort zone and made connections with other people on the same journey. That's why I practiced web development every single day until I got a job doing that for a living. It's why I'm constantly on the search for things which will give my life meaning. I would love to say that it's a commitment to principle, a desire to free the world and love for rational people, but envy and horror have undoubtedly been bigger motivators for me. I don't know that I would say that in an interview, though... XD

1. If you could demonstrate how UPB could be used to arbitrarily prove any behavior is moral, then please do so. 2. This seems to be multiple claims that don't seem to be connected to each other, as far as I can tell, so: 2a. One of the several proofs offered is the "you can't argue against UPB without assuming UPB". This is not a trivial thing. If your counter argument assumes the validity of UPB, then the you are the one saying that UPB is true, by implication. I am in no way obligated to answer your challenge, logically, because we agree, even if you also disagree. 2b. UPB has nothing whatever in any way to do with subjective preferences. The word "preferable" in UPB is used to describe how a moral theory satisfies the conditions of universality and logical consistency. A behavior cannot be true or false, but it can be preferable. That is, if you want a the moral theory informing an action to be UPB, it has to satisfies these conditions. It's the "preferable" you use when you say: "if you want to get to the library, it is preferable that you take Birch st north". To analogize, UPB isn't evaluating the actual actions you take in driving to the library, but the argument about what you should do to get to the library. 3. The opposite of "not murder" (the moral good) must necessarily include in some capacity some level of murder. "Opposite" perfectly describes what he's talking about in the book. It's why no positive action can be said to be UPB (i.e. the coma test). It's opposite and not "negation" because there are 7 moral categories and the negation of "the good" is not necessarily evil, but aesthetic or neutral claims.

Haha. I look pretty silly now. It would have been nice to know Joel posted before I made mine XD

One personality type for certain is the narcissist. My buddy Joel wrote this great article that talks about this, here: https://medium.com/@joelpatterson_52315/narcissistic-supply-emotional-vampirism-as-a-symptom-of-unmet-childhood-needs-3b01d0f083a1 Here's a quote:

Tell me more I don't understand what is good or positive about it. So, just to clarify, I don't actually feel angry with my parents. I rarely think of them, in fact. I exert no effort toward sustaining any anger at them. I actually think that I would disagree with you here. I don't think that people should exert extra effort to feel anger or any other emotion. I hope that's not what came across in my video/writing. I don't think that people should do that. Rather, I think people should just be honest with themselves about what they do feel, rather than telling themselves that it's wrong or bad to feel it. To exert extra effort to feel a certain emotion isn't exactly suppression, but neither is it feeling what you feel organically and without a filter, like shame or obligation or fear at what people might think, etc. That was really all I was trying to say. There may be reasons to exert that effort, like when you have particular difficulty crying, and pushing helps you cry which shows you that you can do it, and thereby gain some self efficacy. But what's the purpose of making yourself more angry than the situation organically warrants? I don't know. Nothing? Anger can heal, but not simply because you feel it. It's a targeted radioactive element. It should come out of moral clarity. Otherwise it's a cure with no illness. And you risk doing damage like you mentioned, to no end. Also, I don't know if it really is suppressing the emotions which causes depression. It sort of makes sense to me, and I know I've made that case before, but I'm wondering now if, actually, it's the self deception that causes the depression. In other words, what do you have to tell yourself in order to stop feeling what you feel? "I'm being hysterical [or petty], I should stop" "a wise mature person wouldn't feel this" "getting upset just makes me as bad as them" etc What negative self talk that is, coming in and replacing what is organic, natural and truly you. It's a hollowing out. I don't feel motivation or much of anything at all when I'm empty inside. Just some thoughts. Let me know if they make any sense, or if you believe me to be in error. Take care!

Maybe nothing at all, haha. Just kidding. I think that love is definitely possible in therapy. The two might not even be mutually exclusive. I probably reached a bit far with that one. It might be more accurate to say that it's definitely not in the interest of healthy therapy to also sleep with your therapist. And being that people have reported that it was absolutely terrible for them in the long run, enough that it became an offense that would lose you your license, I think it's a good enough reason to suspect. Nobody prevents you from dating your dentist. I, um... *cough* maybe might have some experience with having those kinds of feelings in therapy. Don't tell anybody! It was not mutual, but talking about it sure helped me work through some things. I'm very glad it happened, in the end. I think that real love is our involuntary response to virtue, if we are ourselves also virtuous. I think that love is definitely possible in therapy. I am just convinced that it shouldn't be become a sexual relationship. I honestly don't understand transference enough to talk about most people, and their romantic relationships. That would be interesting to hear about though. What do you think?

Voluntary and involuntary is a true dichotomy as "involuntary" is the negation of "voluntary" (i.e. not voluntary). You could argue that our cognitive abilities are diminished (as men) in the presence of any woman we find attractive. If someone paid you a million dollars not to do it, would that change your mind? Then it is voluntary, even if that decision is heavily slanted. Having sex with your therapist, if both parties are consenting is voluntary. It's not really so much that it's a power disparity (I don't really think that it is), but more that romantic and sexual feelings that show up are almost without exception going to be some form of transference rather than genuine love, and thus acting out a shared delusion. You also can't be a therapist for your friends or lovers.

This is the basic argument is this: premise 1) Feelings are subjective, qualitative unfalsifiable experiences conclusion 1) I cannot tell you what you do or don't feel, and for me to try kinda makes me an asshole (e.x. "no, you don't feel hurt") p2) The statement "you don't listen" can be validated, even if it is difficult (by repeating back, or showing they are deaf, etc) p3) The statement "you don't listen" is not subjective, first person or unfalsifiable c2) "You don't listen" is not a feeling p4) "Psychological manipulation is a type of social influence that aims to change the perception or behavior of others through underhanded, deceptive, or even abusive tactics." - Google p5) Framing the accusation "You don't listen" as if it were a feeling is false p6) A consequence of sharing a feeling is that no one can argue with it (because it is subjective) c3) The effect of framing "you don't listen" as a feeling is that people can't argue with it p7) To say false things, expecting them to take it as true, for a particular effect is deceptive p8) The intent of saying this is clearly for the purpose of changing the perceptions and behavior of others (e.x. to get them to listen more, or apologize, etc) c4) Saying "I feel like you don't listen" is manipulative This argument does not preclude the possibility that you do it because you can't prove the claim. If the claim was "you entered my dream last night and gave me a nightmare", it would still be manipulative. In fact, you could argue that makes it even more manipulative, because you are in even less of a position to defend yourself. If you are engaged with a bully and can't reasonably get away, then I don't think there is anything necessarily wrong with being manipulative. I heard that psychologists are often trained to use manipulation, like with certain personality disorders (don't quote me on that). So, it's not as simple as "manipulation is always bad". I'm mostly talking about actual relationships, like with friends or lovers as is, I believe, the context with which the OP asked her question. If she is dating a bully, then maybe she should just leave. If she is not, then I don't think this sort of "I feel" statement is just. It's one example of manipulation. There are several "OP is too X" or "Stef is too X" kinds of statements that are being made and responded to, but not so much in the way of logical arguments, or standards, or anything to actually measure against. (Where X can mean "manipulative" or "abrasive"). The problem with that is that I can just say "nope, Stef was not too abrasive" and no counter argument is logically required of me (because arguing against what, exactly). And I do believe what I'm saying, I'm not just being a contrarian. If someone is doing something bad and needs to improve, then we have to know what the principle is, or all it is is anxiety management, and not living a principled life, is counterproductive. So far, we don't know what the principles are, so I'm attempting to provide what principles are and why they are important. I'm trying to do what I'm prescribing. Without the principle, there is no possibility of resolution.

I could totally be misunderstanding and I apologize if this is totally unhelpful. But I don't think that an emotion can be manipulative. Have you read Real Time Relationships? I think there is a really big difference between these two statements: 1) I feel like you never listen and 2) I feel hurt and resentment, and I also have a belief in my head that you don't listen enough "You never listen" is not an feeling, and the first statement could really be translated to mean "I feel hurt and resentment and it's because you never listen. My feelings are evidence of this fact." Feeling hurt is not actually evidence, in a strict sense, that the other party doesn't listen. And because it's framed as a "feeling", it's in the land of unfalsifiability. I cannot tell you that you don't feel hurt, obviously. That would be ridiculous. I can't do that because only you know that, subjectively. But whether or not I ever listen is something that is a claim which is true or false. The effect of mixing the two up is that I'm an asshole if I challenge your feeling that that I never listen. That would be manipulative. Being honest about your expectations and your experience of the relationship is not manipulative. -------------------- I guess the way to determine if you fit whatever particular definition of manipulative woman Stef was using, you would need to identify the specific principle. For example, by implication, I put forward the principle that framing conclusions about other people (like in the way I described) as if they were feelings is manipulative. Without knowing what the principle is, I would hesitate to condemn yourself. I would also stay far away from people who make accusations like that without putting forward rational principles / arguments, because all they are really doing is appealing to your insecurity. Also, there's not lesson to learn if you really are doing something bad, so it's pretty pointless. It could simply be that your desire to have integrity and be a good woman is being used against you in an effort to manipulate you, which would be projection on the part of the accuser. Without the principle, I can't really say.

Here's the whole book, for free, online: https://board.freedomainradio.com/page/books/universally_preferable_behavior_a_rational_proof_of_secular_ethics.html The relevant section is called: "The First Test: Rape". (That's where "two guys in a room" is introduced).

This is actually surprisingly difficult, from what I've read. It would require completely rewriting how the page works, possibly changing how audio files are served, and a bunch of other details I'm not smart enough to understand. People who do this sort of thing are incredibly skilled developers and are using systems that are beyond the little PHP and nginx platform FDRPodcasts is served from. That's not to say that it's impossible, but as for building it as a feature into FDRPodcasts, that's not going to happen. At least, not by me. Even if I could build that, it's going to take more time than I have to spare. It's a matter of building a backend that can handle streaming concurrently (as a compiled executable) and a CDN which supports byte range requests. Then you have to build front end that supports all your target browsers which can handle all that's involved in that. All those elements are missing. As far as I know MaxCDN (the CDN the podcasts are hosted on) is not setup to stream, accept byte range requests. Anywhere you get the feed from (e.x. iTunes) requires you to start the download from the beginning,... unless they've downloaded it to their own servers and are doing something fancy. The front end library for handling audio can't start anywhere but the beginning. PHP is not a language that can handle these kinds of requests in a way which is performant. We've got everything working against us in terms of building this as a feature. Maybe someone knows how to get MaxCDN to do this, works in compiled languages and the front end is easier than I think it will be. Then they can compete with FDRPodcasts and maybe win. The ajax ready feeds are there for anyone to use. Anybody who wants to build an interface like the one at FDRPodcasts has everything they need already, short of documentation. Competition makes things better for everyone

Actually no. Dreams are real because they are causal. I don't use the words "real" and "exist" in the same sense that Stef does. I'd be happy to elaborate further on that point specifically over PM (as it's not necessarily relevant to the topic of the thread). Perceptions, beliefs, desires, etc cause things to happen in the objective real world, even if they themselves as objects take up no physical space. My belief that the ground is solid causes me to walk confidently across it's surface without fearing that I will fall through down to the center of the earth. But the manner in which these things are causal is observer relative: only causal because we are here to experience them.

Hi Sean! I think that you are probably right about projecting their anger. I have known a lot of people who consider themselves to be enlightened in the sense that they are above having negative emotions because they just see things from the right perspectives and bla bla bla bla, barf! But whenever I would challenge them, the tension in the room would spike, as if socratic reasoning was this bad thing and I'm some sort of asshole, haha. It seems, at least in the cases I've seen, the people who claim to be most above having "negative" emotions like anger are the most repressed and most reactive when you push their buttons. Probably not a coincidence I'm glad you got some value from the videos I haven't made any in a while. I wasn't sure how interesting or helpful they were for people.

I have a really great response, but it's taking for-fucking-ever to get approved. Just be patient!

Hi Jamesican. Great question! I'll limit my answer to addressing the objectivity of moral arguments, and if there actually is any. First, I don't see how having a god means there is any objective morality. Why is something (im)moral? Because some deity said so? I never grew up with religion, so I could be missing something obvious, of course. UPB is a way of having objective standards regarding behavior. An action cannot be true or false, right? A statement can be true or false, but what UPB describes is behavior and moral arguments regarding behavior. Instead of true/false, it says whether or not something is preferable or not. This is not "preferred" in the sense in which I have subjective preferences for certain bands over other bands. There isn't necessarily any logic to something like a subjective preference. You can think of "preferability" in the UPB sense like this: it is preferable to take Birch st if you want to go to the donut shop. That is, it is "preferable" given some standard. There is a logic to this. "Preferability" is a condition of satisfaction. Taking Birch st satisfies the condition of going to the donut shop. It's equivalent to true/false in terms of being a condition of satisfaction. So, it's preferable given what standard, you might ask? The answer is the "U" in UPB. Universals in philosophy describe things in terms of they means for all instances, as opposed to "particulars" which describe my car vs your car. Simply by defining an action like "murder", there are certain things that we can know about any particular instance. Logic and principles based on this knowledge is working from universals. This does not mean that in every instance of stabbing a guy in the throat, it is immoral. It could be an emergency tracheotomy. UPB is actually a broader category than morality. UPB can say whether something is (im)moral, but it covers the following categories: The Good Aesthetically Positive Personally Positive Morally Neutral Personally Negative Aesthetically Negative Moral Evil UPB says where an action falls in these 7 categories according to the condition of satisfaction: preferability. The fact that there is logic that can tell whether something is proof that objectivity is possible regarding behavior and how to reason about it. The specific categories listed above are defined at the beginning of Part 2: Application. Getting into the definitions and the logic of each category would take a long time to describe, but luckily the book is totally free. You may wonder if the categories are arbitrary and thus subjective. The thing about that is, whether they belong in a particular category has logical consequences. For instance, in UPB, moral evils are actions where it is justified to use force in order to prevent. So, if someone is raping another person, or raping you, you are justified in smashing that person over the head in order to escape. Here's a quotation to give you some idea of how logic is applied here:

You could ask anybody in particular over PM that you like. If there's somebody who's posts seem particularly insightful or helpful or relevant to your issue, then it doesn't hurt to ask. I don't understand why more people don't do that. It's always nice to see messages in my inbox from FDR folk. And yea, what percentient said. The cool badges with crowns on them are cool, but it doesn't necessarily mean anything about a level of participation, insight or knowledge. Except for me. I'm a freakin' genius.

Subjectivity describes the manner in which something is real or true. The way in which "Monet is a better painter than Manet" is true is observer relative. That is, it's true subjectively because I am here to think it. Dreams are subjectively real (as opposed to subjectively true). When we talk about the nature of a thing, we are describing particular properties and functions of that object. Dreams are real subjectively because I am here to experience them. We can have objective criteria when talking about objects, even when those objects exist subjectively. The object "Tomorrowland" (movie) has particular properties and functions. It has a plot, characters, etc and functions like what that popular anti-social guy mentioned. If there is some kind of measure, that means it's an, at least partially, objective criteria. It's value as a movie exists subjectively, but the manner in which it is good (assuming an objective criteria) is objectively true. Subjectively real and objectively true.

Productive philosophy produces clarity and understanding, according to rational standards, typically by use of universals, principles. That is to say that people walk away from it able to apply certain standards or principles to arrive at new and relevant conclusions. That's my definition, anyway. It may well be ego battles, but if it is ego battles, then people's egos come out in full force with this subject, more so than with others. It's not like those two things are mutually exclusive. I mean, I've observed and participated in a dozen of these threads. It's about every 4 months or less. Maybe my own ego battle in a couple of cases, but certainly no one changed their minds, insults flew, lots of passive aggression and condescension, etc.

There used to be a sub-forum about that. The thread where Stef explains why he decided to remove that sub forum seems to be missing. It used to be a sticky in either the Philosophy forum or the general messages forum. If people want to talk about that stuff, they are free to somewhere else. Or they can talk about it over PM, I guess. I don't think that the FDR staff is concerned with being accused of hypocrisy over something like that. Also, I'm not sure I've ever seen a thread get closed down because the topic was determinism. I'm mostly only posting because I put all my money on it being unproductive. There are lots of determinism threads already.

I don't know; seems like her son might be a lot better off learning from virtues being demonstrated by his mother, than by having his mother tell him how he needs to live his life. I mean, if he just does what he's told, that would be living for women, which any responsible parent would never inflict on her child. Oh wait...

This topic is not permitted by the forum guidelines. It, without exception, devolves into something unproductive and frustrating. https://board.freedomainradio.com/index.php?app=forums&module=extras&section=boardrules To hear all the FDR content on determinism, you can go here: http://www.fdrpodcasts.com/#/search/determinism

Well, what's the charge? It's that it's abuse isn't it? What are we talking about when we say "abuse"? If somebody hits me with just enough force to knock over a soda can, that's not going to do anything to deter me from doing what I want, right? I mean, that would defeat the purpose of the snapping and hitting, wouldn't it? I don't know that I've ever seen someone hit another person that softly before, actually. A parent who doesn't hit hard enough to frighten or hurt the child is doing something that's pretty pointless. What good what that do them? It's more than reasonable to assume that this is the case that it was hard enough to frighten or hurt. In fact, I'm not even sure what you are asking us to consider. Unless it's some kind of slight at the OP. I mean, it would imply some pretty extreme hypersensitivity on the part of the OP, right? I've been hit before and the decibel level wasn't really a factor from what I remember, so volume isn't a good criteria. Abuse doesn't have to make a sound at all, and I doubt you would disagree. I just did a google search for "abusive behavior" and the first result includes the following examples of abusive behavior: Dominance Humiliation Isolation Threats Intimidation Denial and blame Snapping at and hitting a child, even if we take a mild interpretation of these words still imply abuse according to experts in the field. It's threatening, humiliating, intimidation and dominating whatever way you cut it. And you may disagree with this criteria, in which case it would be incumbent upon you to present this new standard and make your case as to why it is better. Standards for abuse used in the show, in this thread and according to the first google result all point to abuse, which could totally be wrong, but to suggest that it's baseless is kinda your burden to prove. And I don't know what you're talking about with the subjective stuff. I mean, what exactly is objective about your response? You _feel_ like it's PC chomping wolves, "too reflexive", "highly un-objective", etc. I don't know what any of that means. It certainly sounds bad, but it's not like a standard is given, or anything that we, the readers of your post, can use to independently arrive at your conclusion through an analysis of the reason and evidence. The OP presented the facts and his experience of the interaction, in fact, I didn't think it was too subjective or vague, and still don't. At least, not because you say so. Ironically, I'm not at all sure what your criticism even is. People shouldn't do what exactly? They shouldn't accept that the interaction was abusive? Or they shouldn't express contempt for the woman prior to asking more questions? I don't know. You may "feel" like people are hypersensitive and should get some perspective, or whatever (not actually a "feeling", but whatever), and maybe this is true. Just present the reason and evidence and we'll be able to validate your logic and conclude for ourselves what to think about that. How was that? Was that worthy of the stand, your honor?

I (mistakenly?) took your previous comment: "Yes, exactly the way I started off my response :)" to be a kind of "yeah I'm guilty of it, so what?!" The post you quoted of mine was operating from this assumption. It appears that I have mistaken your meaning, and I apologize for assuming the worst. Text isn't the best medium for getting tone across. And my post wasn't intended to punish you or make you feel bad or anything like that. I'm just trying to get a principle across that applies more often than you might think. It will probably make a lot more sense if you consider my misreading of your first response. I was actually quite surprised by this latest response, and to find that I went down like 5 points in reputation. What I experienced as expressing my own frustration about something that happens a lot is taken as a toxic, punitive condemnation, with a "what the fuck is your problem?" thrown in there. My experience of our exchange is clearly different than yours. Hope that clarifies things a bit.